Book excerpt: She’s a charismatic Mexican-American heiress, running for re-election as president of the United States. They are a ruthless international conspiracy with, literally, a killer agenda, willing to do anything required to defeat her. The Salvation Project is a secret conspiracy of international elites convinced that democracy is a hopelessly inadequate and dangerous form of government to cope with the multiple existential threats posed by global warming, nuclear proliferation, artificial intelligence, genetic editing, and other advanced science emerging from the world’s laboratories. The Salvation Project’s goal: take control of the world's most powerful and scientifically advanced nations and create a global autocracy, with the United States as the most important target. U.S. President Isabel Aragon Tennyson (“Tenny,” as the world knows her) is running for reelection, unaware of the Salvation Project, the threat it poses to democracy in the U.S. and elsewhere, or the fact that her election opponent is a Manchurian-like candidate who would deliver the keys to the White House to Salvation Project leaders. The election will determine not just who will be president, but the future of democracy, and perhaps the future of humanity.